Meatball Sunday

Its been a lazy day today. Even Doggie Chops lazed out. This was the position he was in most of day, be it on the floor, the couch or his personal favourite: the arm of the couch.

Maybe its the weather. Its freezing here so staying inside relaxing is his favourite thing at the moment. Thankfully, the rain has abated and we're in no danger of getting flooded anymore.

Minced beef was taken out of the freezer last night with the intention of having Spaghetti Bolognaise today; stew was then mentioned; then Cottage Pie; then burgers (but we had them earlier in the week); we finally settled on Meatballs with Spicy Tomato sauce and once again cubed roasted potatoes. This form of potato cooking has become an obsession in this house. The spicy tomato sauce is another fall back for us. Its so easy, its just tinned tomatoes, chopped onion, chopped red chilli or dried chilli flakes and garlic. You let it bubble away for a while, probably half hour or so and blend it down to a smooth sauce. If you've any parmesan rind floating around you can throw it in too, they add a nice background flavour but don't forget to take it out before you blend the sauce.

The meatballs are your standard beef, finely diced chopped onion, little bit of garlic, seasoning and some Italian herbs such as dried oregano and basil. Pour the cooked sauce over the cooked meatballs and enjoy. The picture quality isn't great, took it on my phone as my camera is dead! But you get the idea.

Now a slew of cookery programmes awaits us. There's Saturday Kitchen, Kitchen Meltdown and Come Dine With Me. Oh and maybe a glass of wine to accompany the relaxation.

This week, we've been mostly eating nice dinners!

Its been a week of comfort food and grub hugs. Mr Chops was getting in on the cooking this week practically shoving me out of the kitchen so he could take over...so I let him. Thursday it was homemade burgers, mash and onion gravy. Friday, he did full chicken roast, yummy. Well it was the supreme of chicken with the usual extras of roasted potatoes, stuffing, gravy & veg. One of his favourite things to do in the kitchen is to joint a chicken so we got two decent dinners out of a small chicken that was on offer in the butchers the other evening. Tonight it was one of our fall-back favourites: Spanish style stew. My recipe but his execution! He served it with roasted cubes of potatoes, very delish.

Its a simple dinner. Roughly chop up some chorizo and fry it off gently until it releases its oils, set aside. You the sear off chicken pieces, we used legs and thighs, dusted with flour and smoked paprika. Remove the skin. Then you add tinned tomatoes, chopped red chilli, sliced red pepper, sliced onion, garlic, good pinch of oregano, squeeze of tomato puree, pinch of sugar, good pinch of smoked Spanish paprika and plenty of seasoning. It should be a wet stew but thick if you follow me. Add the chorizo for the last half hour of cooking. It should take an hour in total to cook. The chicken should be loose from the bone. The heat from the chilli should be a background hint and not blow your head off! Its the perfect dinner for a cold winter's night.

The weather outside is frightful

Well it has been raining quite a lot where I am; the flood warning has been given; and we've to hope high tide later goes well for the area or we'll be sandbagging the doors. The Chops family took a stroll in the local area earlier this evening and I have to say that some people haven't gotten off so well and there's a few feet of water in their houses.

The bad weather has put me in the mind of comfort food and what works really well on an evening like this. I'd decided I was definitely having some kind of mashed potato. Mr. Chops wasn't feeling great so it was a one-woman dindins. I decided that as it was a solo effort that I was gonna roast up some garlic and add it to the mash. I consider it a guilty pleasure.

So I roasted the garlic (as much or as little as you want) with the skin left on the cloves, in a little drop of olive oil, wrapped in tin foil for around 30mins at 160C (fan). Let it cool down and then squeeze it from the skins into the mashed spuds. Needless to say, you have to add loads of butter and seasoning to the mash. I like it nice and buttery and when feeling really decadent I add a little drop of cream. I actually got a present of a potato ricer last Christmas and it has changed the way we eat mash in this house. It keeps the potato fluffy and soft. This is the model Mr. Chops got me, now there's a man who knows what his woman wants!!!

I ate my mash with sirloin steak, steamed broccoli and sautéed mushrooms. Now the steak wasn't great, it was a last-minute supermarket buy and was a little bit tough and chewy and Doggie Chops did get some leftovers today. Compared to the aged steaks we've been getting at our local butchers recently it was a definite let down so therein is the lesson: butcher bought is definitely best.

Now back to my studies, which I should have been doing while adding to this little blogeen.

Thoughts of Christmas

So its that time of year again...I know its only November but Mr. Chops and I have been discussing our Christmas dinner already. It looks like its just going to be us again this year which is a very blissful thought indeed. Its nice to cook the dinner our way and by our own schedule. Last year was the same. We got up around 10.30am, opened the presents and got most excited by Doggie Chops' reaction to his pressies; there's nothing like watching a dog eviscerate wrapping paper, joy to the world indeed! After a leisurely morning of stuffing the turkey; changing the vegetable water in various pots; and early morning home-cooked ham and brown bread for breakfast, we had a nice long walk with said Doggie who was wearing his Santa jacket. Westhighland Terrier's look very fetching in red it really shows off their noses:

Late afternoon, we had our starter. The plan of action was at least 1-2hours between starter and main course and sure an auld drop of wine inbetween! Our starter last year was a Tomato & Chorizo tartlet. It was my own invention. I defrosted the puff pastry and halved one sheet; created an edge by scoring it lightly with knife, pricked the middle part and then spread over sliced cherry tomatoes, fried slices of chorizo (the full sausage not the pre-sliced packets you get) and a good sprinkling of grated mozarella. Cooked it in the oven for roughly 20-25mins approx and served with a peppery salad of rocket and watercress. To accompany it we popped open a bottle of pink Cava from Tesco. It was a lovely start to the meal.

When we were ready for the main event and the turkey had its sufficient time. We sat down to the traditional full meal with all the trimmings: roast turkey, honey & mustard roast ham, roast potatoes, roast carrots with honey, roast parsnips with maple syrup, potato stuffing, bread stuffing and gravy. Mr.Chops didn't speak for at least an hour, so I think he enjoyed it. Then we weren't the only ones who had pig for Christmas:

Just an observation:

For a blog about cooking I've done very little...

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It is only right that I'm embarrassed.

Sorry, It's Been a While

Yeah, its been ages actually, over a month apparently (insert sad smiley face here please). Cooking has been on the down-low due the Mr. Chops being on overtime a lot and who can be bothered cooking for one, night after night? I've been putting a lot of effort into Doggie Chops recently because he had a sick tummy so it was a strict diet of chicken, rice and some pasta. I've been slowly trying to introduce dog nuts back into his diet but it seems Doggie Chops is an animal of discerning taste and palate and not everything is acceptable. Though, he has no problem with sausages, burgers, stew, toast, biscuits, pretzels.....basically whatever I'm eating! Also, I've started an Open University course about Leonardo da Vinci and I've been trying to get ahead on it cos there's lots of reading. But I'm feeling awfully intelligent reading dem big words.

Anyway, tonight I watched 'Julie & Julia'. For those who don't know, its the film of New Yorker Julie Powell's year long blog to cook her way through Julia Child's 'Mastering the Art of French Cookery'. Meryl Streep plays Julia and Amy Adams plays Julie. Since I saw Amy in Enchanted she has become a favourite actress of mine. She's brilliant in 'Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day' as well. I digress, the film is sweet, warm and engaging. Both the leads are amazing, though that's kind of a given with Meryl. For anyone who's ever seen footage of Julia Childs I think Meryl really captures her, though I'd like to know how they made her tower over Stanley Tucci (he plays husband Paul) it was a feat of cinema magic. The film has inspired me to order Volume I of Julia's book and her autobiography from Amazon. I'll read the biog first methinks and I'll cherrypick from the cookery book; I don't have the discipline or the time at the moment, but I have to say I felt the inclination to make Boeuf Bourguignon. If you watch the movie you'll understand why.

What amazed me most about the movie is loving way the food is shot. You're salivating watching it and my gosh did I want duck after I watched. So that's my recommendation for today: Julie & Julia.

Speaking of duck, I had delicious crispy duck last night from the local Chinese (see I'm not cooking). It was falling off the bone but still a little bit pink in the middle and the Hoisin was unctious and sweet. Even Mr. Chops liked it and he doesn't like duck that much or Chinese food.